Fire Within
by WingedWolf121
Summary: The Phoenix has come to Charles before. Whenever he was vulnerable, it was there to offer power. Charles has refused...but he can't resist the Phoenix forever. Charles/Erik slash, Phoenix!Charles. Warning for language and child abuse
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: The world needs more Phoenix!Charles, I think there's only two fics about him. And I am aware that he has some sort of super powerful psychic thingy called Onslaught, but that would require research other than typing "Phoenix Force" into wikipedia and reading the first paragraph of the first article. I refuse to do more research than that because Marvel is enormous and complicated and there was a ridiculous amount of information. So if the Phoenix is ooc…sue me. My only knowledge of Kurt Marko is that he was Charles's stepfather and some kind of scientist (again, first paragraph of first wikipedia article). In my defense, I started this during finals week, and was absolutely sick of doing research.**

**Warnings for: Slash, Child Abuse, Rape, Blood, **

**Disclaimer: You think I own MARVEL? Heh. If I owned Marvel, Charles and Erik would be together frolicking in fields with unicorns.**

Charles Xavier could always read minds. Before he could talk. Before he could walk. Before he could even understand what he was hearing, there were images floating through his mind, feelings that weren't his own.

It was a neverending struggle just to keep his own thoughts in his head, separate from the constant noise, the thoughts that rang in his brain even when he was alone. And he was alone more often than naught.

He knew who to trust. He knew how much his Mother _really _loved him. He knew that the maids thought he was odd, that the butler hated his job, that everyone had their pockets of light and dreams and hopes and hate.

Charles knew the moment his mother brought home her new husband that Kurt Marko was a bad man. That did not stop his mother from leaving her son alone with his new Stepfather.

The sound of the slap echoed through the foyer. Charles backed up, his eyes wide, as the thoughts streamed at him

_I'll teach this little fuck who rules this house right now, I can already tell he's going to be a little pansy, not worthy of this place at all, no wonder Sharon doesn't have high hopes for him, ugly little brat too, and look at those eyes, so fucking ridiculous you'd think he was born to be on his knees with eyes that big, I'll teach him exactly what it means to live in my house_

"Stop, stop." Charles's voice came out as a whimper. "Please, stop, I'm sorry, I can change-"

"Shut up." This time, his new stepfather's hand connected with his chest, and sent him to the floor. The man grinned down at him. "Well you're a little coward, aren't you?"

_Coward, can't even stand up to fight himself, he deserves this just for those tears, can't believe he's crying already that faggot, begging just like he should, we'll see if he can beg when I'm done_

"I won't beg, I'll stop, I'll do anything just please stop." Charles clutched his head. This man's thoughts were strong, thundering through his head and drowning out his mother's blurred moaning from upstairs, the maid who was stealing, the maid whose father was sick, just making it all into one roar of rage that was somehow _all his fault_.

_Pathetic, I'll be doing him a favor toughening him up, though nothing is going to make this boy into anything but a piece of shit, spoiled and rich with nothing to show for all that wealth but a pretty face_

Charles pressed his hands to his ears. "Shut up, please just shut up!"

"I hadn't spoken. You little freak." _Fucking crazy to boot, but what else can you expect from a bitch like Sharon_

"Don't call my mother a bitch!" Charles snapped. The fear was replaced for a second by childish indignation. "She's the only reason you've got anything, and you know it! You were just a failing scientist before she found you!"

_What's that little fuck done, the bitch wouldn't talk to him she hardly notices he exists and with good reason, who'd want to remember that they were barren now and their only son was this worthless boy _

"Stop it, stop it, stop it." Charles slid to the floor, clutching his head. It was so _loud_, so hateful, not even as horrible as his mother when she was angry or the maids when they didn't want him around, no one else's thoughts burned in his mind like oil on fire, because this mind was twisted and hateful and hated _him._

_Must be crazy, makes sense with his upbringing, think I'll slap him silly then start on his mother _

_No! Don't you dare touch her!_ Stepfather's eyes widened. Charles realized that he hadn't said that out loud, hadn't said anything out loud at all, that he'd yelled those words in his thoughts and somehow put them into Stepfather's mind.

_How did you do that?_ It was like having a sledgehammer thrown into his skull. Rage. Hate. He didn't even see his Stepfather stepping closer, fist clenched. He did feel the pain when a blow connected with his shoulder, then another with his head.

Unconsciousness was a blessing.

* * *

><p>"I am Charles Xavier, and I am sane. I am Charles Xavier, and I am sane. I am Charles Xavier, and I am sane." He was afraid to stop repeating the chant. If he did, he might forget.<p>

He'd forgotten a lot. Charles wasn't quite sure where he was. He knew that it was a very small room, a dark room with no windows. There was a big door locking him in. He knew that he was lying on a cot with a mattress that might have been made of stone, on top of a thin sheet. He knew that his Stepfather had somehow put him here, though the details were fuzzy.

Other than that, he couldn't remember, because he couldn't _think._ There was too much noise. The attendants who came in daily and injected something into his arm with a needle, who would hurt him without remorse if he struggled and Charles knew that, knew everything because he couldn't block any of it out.

Here of all places, he needed to be able to make the voices stop. Everyone was screaming. Even the ones who couldn't use words were screaming. Charles clutched his knees tighter to his chest and tried not to hear the wails.

But he _couldn't. _

It was as if something had turned his precise mental control soft, and now everything came in bits and pieces, all disjointed, all blurry. Whenever the tiniest bit of clarity came to his mind, it was time for the people in white to come and put another needle in his arm. Then he was sinking back into the oceans of voices.

It didn't take long for Charles to stop floating in the minds of the insane, and start drowning.

"He's just lying there, isn't there some way to wake the kid up?" A physical voice. Charles saw the person standing in front of the bed, but did not process the image. His brain was devoted to the massive task of keeping the voices from crushing him.

"God knows. You should hear the list of drugs he's on. Little kid has a _fucked up_ mind." Rough hands on his shoulders. "Hey, get up."

A light shined on his pupils. A disgusted noise.

"His pupils aren't responding. We'll just have to leave him here, don't take him out in the yard." A snicker. "Probably better for him. We've got enough of _that _sort already without giving them a new plaything."

The heavy iron door shut. Charles remained unmoving, staring into nothing and unable to do anything but let the voices run through him, and repeat that one phrase inside his mind.

_I am Charles Xavier. I am Charles Xavier. I am Charles Xavier. I am Charles Xavier_

* * *

><p>"We're putting him on another drug? Jesus Christ, he must have no mind left."<p>

"Pentylenetetrazol. We got a call about it-the guy even specified the dosage." Charles barely felt the needle in his arm.

"Any reason?"

"How the hell should I know? The higher ups tell me _nothing. _I think his relative might have called." Charles only heard two words of the man's thought, the rest were all lost in the cacophony.

_Kurt Marko_ The name stood out through all the screams. Charles's eyes snapped fully open, and he began to shake.

"Shit! He's going into a seizure!"

_Stepfather. Stepfather. Stepfather_. Terror entirely his own gripped Charles. He tried to scream-what, he had no idea. But the sound caught in his throat, which suddenly seemed so full of liquid or vomit or perhaps it was just his tongue?

Whatever it was, Charles was not in any kind of control. Muscles used to inertia were suddenly contracting, relaxing for moments only to seize up again.

_Stepfather. Stepfather. Stepfather._

Hands holding him down, while Charles coughed out chunks of food he hadn't known he'd eaten and convulsed on the cot. An attendant holding up his head and stopping him from smashing it against the wall.

In retrospect, that call had saved his sanity. Details formerly lost in the haze of drugs and voicing came flooding back to him. The Xavier mansion. That there was such a thing as sunlight, the feeling of how it warmed one's cheeks. The vague affection his mother felt for him.

_I want to go home!_ cried Charles's mind. He frantically tried to struggle. Neither of these men were going to let him go! The bits of disconnected mind in him battered against each other, all broken.

"That little fucker just _bit _me! Come on, we've got better things to do." A rough hand shoving him back into his corner, so hard that his head cracked on the wall. Charles whimpered and squeezed his eyes shut.

There had to be some way to not be here, to stop the voices from screaming so close to him, stop them from deafening his own _mind._

Charles opened his eyes.

It was all gone. No more prison cell.

He was under his favorite tree on the grounds, where he could lean against the bark of the trunk and not be seen because the branches hung so low. The grassy field that the staff so carefully trimmed stretched before him, leading up to the castle that was Xavier manor.

"I am Charles Xavier, and I am sane." Charles whispered.

The only difference between his home and this illusion was the burning. Thousands of slips of paper falling from the sky, all of them on fire. Thoughts were scribbled onto them, the innermost screams of his fellow inmates all turning to ash before they hit the ground. Charles leaned against the tree.

It still felt like the filthy wall of his cell.

His forehead wrinkled. In an instant there was crinkly bark brushing against his thin cotton shirt.

No. No inmates uniform. He was dressed in slacks and a cardigan. He was clean. There was soft sunlight warming his cheeks. Charles simply closed his eyes and repeated himself.

"I am Charles Xavier, and I am sane." He corrected details whenever they appeared. The grass had to be kept perfectly trimmed. The leaves on the tree had to be that perfect midsummers green they always were at this time of year. Every window on the manor should have the correct curtains.

It took a long time for him to realize that there was an absolutely foul smell in the air. Charles frowned and tried to correct it. _The faint aroma of dinner, a chicken maybe, being roasted in the kitchens was wafting across the lawn._

He could not quite change the scent. Charles angrily clenched his fists. Something was intruding on his sanctuary. Something was wrong in the tiny world he'd made. He flinched, and blinked.

The cell around him made Charles want to cry. There was filth on the walls again, no light but what came through the slit in his door. He was dirty and smell rather than clean and well groomed.

But the foulest odor wasn't coming from him. There were plates of food heaped around him, most of it rotting. The attendants must have simply left the meals there when they administered the drugs, hoping that he would notice the food and eat.

There was an awful lot of food there. Charles looked at his arm. In addition to being horribly pale, it was nothing but skin and bone. He shivered and leaned forward to pick up one of the bowls.

His arms shook when he picked it up. Somehow, he had become terribly weak. Charles choked down half the bowl. He would have at least attempted the full thing, but his hands trembled when he lifted the spoon to his lips. He spilled half the slop down his front.

Charles could not summon the energy to pick up another plate.

"I am Charles Xavier, and I am sane." He retreated into the illusion. Now he could see a few tendrils of cloud drifting over the sky, and frowned at them. If they rained, the thoughts might stop burning, and then all this relative peace would be gone.

"Get out!" The clouds turned dark. Charles clutched his temples, digging in with nails grown long. The pain did nothing to help his control. "This place is mine!"

The clouds turned to thunderheads. Charles whimpered and scrabbled at his head, where thoughts were breaking through. All the screams were going from a muted haze to full on wails.

"I am Charles Xavier, and I am sane." He frantically whispered. "Stop it, shut up, you have to shut up, you have to stop, I don't want to hear, please shut up! I am Charles Xavier and I am sane…"

"_**I know that, you don't need to repeat it**_." said a rich voice. Charles looked up. "_**I know everything about you**_."

His illusion had changed. The thunderheads were gone, and so were the burning scraps of paper. Everything was dominated instead by a massive blue and white form above him, one that was hotter than the sun and gazing down at him without eyes.

"Who are you?" Whispered Charles. The force seemed to peer down at him. It was as tall as the manor, with a white hot center and two wings covering the sky, shielding Charles.

"_**I am the Phoenix**_." The voice rolled from somewhere in the center of the force. "_**You want to go home**_?"

"Yes." Charles wanted that more than anything. To be in his own safe and comfortable bed, to be able to focus his thoughts again. To get out of this miniature hell.

"_**I can help you**_." The wings stretched out, circling around him. "_**The humans have pumped you full of medication to slow your mind. I will purge it from you**_." Charles gagged and the illusion seeped away. He was back in his cell, kneeling on the edge of his cot, vomiting.

It was like a light being opened. There was his cell, but it wasn't blurred around the edges. There were the screams, but with effort he could push them away, make them into background noise.

"_**I can do better.**_" The Phoenix was with him. It was behind him, spreading it's wings over him.

Silence. True, blessed, silence. Charles had never experienced such _peace_ before. He turned to the Phoenix, nothing short of adoration in his eyes.

"_**The human is coming. The attendant who has fogged your mind for nearly a year now.**_"

"I've been here a whole _year?"_ Charles turned to the door with angry eyes. Tiny blue flames flickered in their depths. The orderly entered the cell to find an awake and aware child, with fury in his mind.

"_**It is time for me to leave. You will release me."**_ The Phoenix and Charles spoke in the same instant. The man's mind snapped.

"Of course. We just did a mental assessment of you, and you're more than fit to be released." He said, with the voice of a dullard. Charles followed him down the corridors, where on either side of him cells echoed with the screams of the insane.

He ignored them. These pitiful beings had done nothing for him. Why should he heed their cries? Charles marched past them, and those with the remnants of sanity still within them flinched away.

"_**I will be leaving today. The limo is coming now."**_

"Of course." The staff member in the office waved him past with hazy eyes. His mind had buckled when the Phoenix touched it. "Take anything you want."

"Thank you." _**I should hope so.**_ There was a sudden dissonance.

Charles frowned at the Phoenix behind him. There was no reason to exclude common courtesy. _**Don't waste words on them. Would they lift a finger to help you?**_

"I suppose not…" Charles said hesitantly. He raised a hand, assembling a plate of food from what was in the staff rooms. It floated to him, the best bits of homemade lunches and delicacies from faculty dinners.

_I didn't think I could make things move like that._

"_**I have greater power than you can imagine." and it is all yours.**_ Charles flexed his fingers. The Phoenix wrapped itself around him, and blue flames sprung from his fingertips. Charles lifted his hand higher.

The orderly who had brought him to the front office let out a gurgling cry. Charles's eyes widened as the human rose into the air, hacking up blood. Charles yanked his hand back, releasing the man.

_**What are you doing? Kill him!**_

"No! I can't do that to someone!" Charles didn't care that he was speaking out loud and someone might hear him. He could make any of these humans forget.

_**He is your enemy, and he lies on the floor helpless. Take vengeance.**_

"I don't want vengeance." Blue flames roared around them. "I want to go home."

_**You should go home with a trail of blood.**_ The Phonix flared brighter. Charles shook his head, trying to stop the heat from pressing in. _**Take the power. Slay him.**_

"No!" Charles glared, and flung out a hand. "Shut up!"

_**You are not yet ready.**_

"And I'll stay so! Get out of my mind!" There was a low chuckle, and a sound like fluttering feathers. Then the world filled up with noise.

* * *

><p>When Charles stepped back through the door to the manor, it seemed impossible that a year had gone by. The overly ornate woodwork was the same. The way nothing looked touchable was the same.<p>

"Charles." His mother was wearing her same red dress.

_Happy to see him back, but it was clear that much had passed. There was the slowness of constant drinking, a broken apathy. _Sharon Xavier's eyes darted behind her when a heavy step sounded.

"Why, Charles." Charles flinched at the same instant his mother did. "So wonderful to have you home."

"S-stepfather." His voice shook. Kurt Marko smiled at him coldly.

_Fucking child I can still kill you, read my mind and see that I can, see those whips in my lab and the chains and the weapons lying all around you and the muscles on my arms, see how easy it would be for me to snap one of your brittle little bones._

Charles's fear shone in his eyes. His mother looked away. Stepfather's lips twitched up.

In a dark corner of his mind, Charles was sure that the Phoenix would know exactly how to deal with Stepfather

* * *

><p>There was silence in the West Wing.<p>

No maids went in to dust. No inquiring butlers went in to clean up whatever mess the Master had left. None of the construction workers constantly renovating the lower levels entered to ask their employer about just how he wanted the newest bomb shelter.

Even if a servant had entered, it was doubtful Charles would respond. He was curled up with his back to a wall, his knees locked to his chest. He'd been there for an hour now.

The young boy from the asylum had grown into a startlingly good looking young man, with pale skin and icy blue eyes. But he sat in the same pose, as if in his mind's effort to cope his body had frozen.

Of course, there were changes. He wasn't in a prison cell, just a remote corner of the manor. In the Asylum he hadn't been sitting in a pool of various fluids, with his pants around his ankles.

He should never have let himself go to this remote little corner. He should have known from the change in his Stepfather's hate that the man had come up with something worse than a beating for him.

_Idiot. _Charles pressed his forehead to his knees. Everything hurt. _You have to get up. What if he goes after Raven? You need to move before she comes looking for you and finds you like this._

But he couldn't bring himself to rise. His head pounded with the glee his Stepfather had felt to see him realize just what was about to happen, and see his terror. It hurt enough just to put weight on his backside, let alone try to move it.

_**Charles, Charles, Charles. Don't you see?**_ He didn't have to move to know who was speaking. There was only one thing in the world that had a voice like that. _**You need me.**_

"N-no, I don't. I have plenty of power." The Phoenix sighed It sent warm tingles down Charles's spine.

_**And yet here you sit, helpless yet again. I can help you.**_ Warmth brushed his cheek, like the caress of super-heated feathers. _**I can make the pain go away. I can keep Kurt Marko from ever hurting you again.**_

Charles slowly looked up. He could still remember the way the guard had been lifted off the floor, the way everything in the world moved under his command. The feeling of flames between his fingers.

_**Are you even capable of imagining what we could do to him?**_ Charles could. He could see his stepfather's face twisting in agony. It was reflected in the white center of the Phoenix, each of the thousand ways he could destroy that man.

"But…"

_**And there will be silence in your mind. I will protect you from every thought the mortals throw at you, let your mind stop bending under the pressure of keeping them out. I can free you.**_ Charles stretched out a hand. In an instant, it was enveloped by hissing flame that sent sparks trailing over his arm and sinking into his skin. _**Let me in, poor wounded child. **_

And the pain was gone. The Phoenix flames trailed down his body, erasing the scars that Kurt had branded into his flesh, every mark that showed the mortal's dominance. Charles lifted himself to his feet in one movement. He clenched a fist, and the nearest vase shattered.

He could do that to his stepfather's toes, one by one.

Toes? Was that the length of his ambition? He could do that to Stepfather's internal organs, roast his eyeballs in his skull, shred his skin and turn his blood to fire.

"_**He is in the lab."**_ The Phoenix crooned. It was with a predator's smile that Charles stalked from the wing to the lower levels, where Kurt Marko was cheerfully working on a weapon to kill thousands.

* * *

><p>Kurt whirled and raised a gun when he heard the door open. His work was hardly legal, and in a manor this large, it was easy to hide bodies.<p>

"Who's there?" Charles closed the door.

"Only me, dear stepfather." Kurt's lip twisted up.

"Back for more? I always knew you were a little faggot at heart." Charles kept smiling. He didn't have to listen to the tide of hate that came from Kurt's thoughts, not with the Phoenix on his side. And the mere words meant nothing.

"No. I've come to murder you." Under normal circumstances, Kurt would have laughed in his stepson's face. But the eerie calm of the boy made him uneasy. It did not look like the same person he had abused for so many years.

"You fucking wish." Kurt fired the gun. Charles chuckled-in a voice that was not his own-and waved a hand. The bullet stopped in midair. Kurt blanched.

"No, I don't think that will work." The gun was ripped from Kurt's hands, as everything in the lab except the man was flung against the back wall. It left Kurt standing alone and uncovered. "Why don't we do this man to man?"

"Man to _man_?" Whatever else could be said about Kurt, he was not one to bow easily. "Man to freak."

"_**Freak?"**_ Flames pulsed in Charles's eyes, spreading to cover the whites and the pupils. _**"I am no freak, Kurt Marko. I am creation itself."**_ A ring of fire sprung up around Kurt. He choked as every molecule in his body was forced down, until he was eagle spread on the floor. _**"And I have come for vengeance."**_

Charles stalked forward, dragging the floorboards up with him. Gas jets started to hiss. Charles paid them no mind. They would only feed his flame, and he was above the effect of any mortal gas.

Kurt's face began to turn purple. Charles put his hands in his pockets and let the man's throat close, his air supply cut off. But such an easy death? After everything this man had done?

"_**No. Your death will not be as easy that."**_ Charles glared, and the circling flames leapt higher. _**"How long do you think I can keep you alive?"**_

Kurt's eyes were wide, revealing yellowed scleras. The scientist within him knew that the boy-that the _god_-who stood before him could not possibly keep his brain functioning without oxygen. But his human side knew better, knew that the power standing before him was not bound by the laws of mankind.

"_**Your fear is good to taste, Kurt Marko. But it is not enough."**_ Charles stopped smiling, rage twisting his face. _**"Years! Years of my life, spent in terror of you, fear that you'd hurt me or Raven or my mother!"**_

"Mercy, please." Kurt croaked out.

"_**You plead like the coward I always thought to be me."**_ Hate filled Charles. All the fear. Every word Kurt Mark had hurled into his brain. Every time he'd flinched at the breakfast table because Kurt's eyes were on him. Every time he had felt terror surface because Kurt was coming home. Every time he had spent the night in too much pain to fall asleep. Every nightmare. Every sob.

And then he dove into Kurt's mind, and let them burn.

Kurt didn't scream. He couldn't, not with Charles flicking the neurons that controlled pain to their highest levels, overloading every sensor in his brain until the pink mass had gone black. By all rights Kurt should have been dead, but the Phoenix kept his heart pumping and blood moving through him. It ripped flesh off bone and muscle off fat. Internal organs became external, hanging in the air above Kurt with veins still connecting them to the heart.

Kurt no longer had a mind. It broke when Charles entered him, and it was obliterated entirely when his stepson began to dissect him. A shimmering cloud of blood hung round both in the air.

_**VENGEANCE IS MINE, SAITH THE GOD**_ echoed inside Kurt's mind, louder than any human mind could bear. His brain simply imploded, turning to a pile of charred gristle that very few doctors could even identify as human.

Charles idly looked at the bits of human hanging in the air, then let the flames consume them. He turned from the lab with a smile on his face.

_**Good, isn't it?**_

_Very._ Charles snapped his fingers, and an explosion ripped through the lab. There was no evidence left.

* * *

><p>Charles breathed deeply and checked himself. No blood, or gore, or flames clinging to his sleeves.<p>

_KnockKnock_ "Raven?"

"Yeah?" Came from within. Charles pushed open the door. Raven lay on her stomach with her feet waving in the air, reading a book. "What's up?"

"Kurt's dead. There was an accident in the lab." Shock flashed over Raven's face, then relief. She jumped to her feet and embraced him.

"That's, oh wow Charles, I…" Raven pressed her face against his shoulder. "I'm glad."

_**Kill her.**_

"What?" Charles said sharply. Raven drew back, looking confused and a little bit guilty.

"I thought you wouldn't be mourning either."

_**She has been here all these years, living under your roof, and has she lifted a finger to help you? Even once used her powers for your benefit? She has stood by for so long, done nothing. She deserves death.**_

"It's not that. Trust me, I'm as relieved as you are." Charles pressed a kiss to Raven's forehead. "I was just having a telepathic creeper moment." Later, Raven would remember that kiss as hot and almost feverish. "I'm going to my room, I'll need a bit of time to absorb this."

"Well, okay…" Uncertainty flickered over Raven's face. They had lain curled up in each other's beds for years under Kurt's reign, each with their own nightmares for the other to comfort. "If you're sure."

_**LET HER BURN**_

"Goodnight." Charles stumbled back to his room, trying to think through the chant of _**burnburnburnburnburn**_**. **He slammed the door shut behind him. "No! She's my _sister!"_

_**She is useless.**_

_It's not Raven's job to take on people like Kurt! _Automatically the conversation had shifted into Charles's mind, the place where both were most communicative.

_**As I said, useless. You are a Phoenix, god amongst men and mutants. Let everyone in this house taste your wrath**_

_Stop it! No!_ Charles collapsed onto his bed. _Stop acting like I'm more different than I already am!_

_**You are different. You are the power of the universe. Bat the mortals down like the flies they are, and start with the blue harlot**_

_Don't call her that!_

_**You think it matters to her? She will honor you as is your due. She is nothing.**_

_She's my little sister, she isn't nothing to me! Shut up about her, about killing, or I'll make you!_

…_**make me? You talk as if I am not part of you.**_

_You want me to murder people!_

_**Hypocrisy. **_

_Stepfather deserved it. Raven is innocent._

_**One piece of flesh is the same as any other.**_

_No they're not, they're not the same! They are very much not the same!_

_**But they are Charles. All of them. You were born to put them out of their misery before they can in their madness move against you**_

_You're insane_

_**I am all the power you could unleash**_

_Stop it! _Charles could feel heat rising in his blood. _Get out of my mind!_

_**I belong here, with you. We are the same.**_ Charles shoved the Phoenix as hard as he could, and was rewarded by a shocked screech. _**You cannot drive me out!**_

_I will!_ Charles struggled against the sudden feeling of talons in his flesh, constricting his breath. _I can!_

His eyes flew open. Charles was crouching on a barren spot of land with a glowing light at his feet, one fed by blue flame that had long since scorched the ground of nourishment. In the darkness around him whorls of light spun round, thundering past pinpricks of pink and blue.

In the center of it all, the Phoenix blazed.

_**Do not make this a battle. Your mind could not handle the backlash.**_

_No._ Charles got to his feet, and held out his hands. _This is my mind, and you are not wanted here. I can cast you out._

_**You will not seek to banish me!**_

Charles's hands flew to his temples. The Phoenix's voice had gone hard, and spikes through his ears could not have caused greater pain.

_You want me to do awful things! You want me to hurt Raven! _Dimly he could see her-Raven's eyes lighting up with laughter, Raven curled up in bed with her hair messy, Raven pleading for him to wake up, come back.

_**Your deeds are your own doing.**_

_And killing Raven will not be one of them._ Charles slowly took his hands from his temples. _Leave now, or I will make you._

_**You need me Charles. There are things to come which will break every part of you. Without me you cannot face them. **_

_I would rather_ Ice began to creep over the barren floor _face the future_ The air crackled with tension _with my sister_ Charles hurled the wave of cold at the Phoenix _And as myself_

The Phoenix screeched when it's wings turned to ice crystals that spread, breaking off chunks of blue that fell away into darkness. The ice kept moving, killing the fire until every part of the Phoenix was a creaking statue. Charles closed his eyes, and that statue shattered. The shards blew back into the darkness.

Lights came hurtling down on him, and Charles's true eyes flew open. He sat up with a hoarse gasp, aware only that voices were crashing through his head as they always had. The silence was gone.

"Charles!" Raven wrapped her arms around him. On reflex, Charles hugged back. The embrace tightened when he realized that she was here, not burned, not murdered. "What happened?"

"Ah." One of the primordial forces was tampering in my head. "Not quite sure. Just a bit of telepathic headache, I think."

"A _bit?_" Raven drew back, though her hands still clutched him. "You've been feverish for hours Charles, God, I came in here because I had a nightmare and I found you curled up screaming under your breath, and the blood-"

"Blood?"

"From your ears at first. Then it started trickling from your nose, and then your eyes. I tried to wipe it or staunch it or something, but my cloth soaked through I couldn't just leave you to find another." Raven hugged him again. Charles rested his chin against her shoulder. "It's all over your face."

Charles touched his cheek. His fingers came away bloody. "Oh. So it is."

"Yes!" Raven shuddered. "I didn't know if you would wake up."

"I'm all right. I promise, I'm alright." He rocked her and made soft shushing sounds, ignoring the fact that they were both trembling.

* * *

><p>When Charles took his mother's life because a disease was ravaging her mind, he thought he heard the Phoenix laugh. He spent that night holding Raven, praying that nothing was remaking itself inside him.<p>

* * *

><p><em><strong>Charles. Charles, you have to listen. Charles, you need me, Charles there will be things in the future, you must have my protection Charles you cannot do this alone, Charles let me back take me back feel me again let the power come again do not trust him Charles you know this in yourself<strong>_

Charles awoke muffling a scream with his arm. His heart pounded. The hissing was gone, but he'd heard it. He'd heard it as a conscious entity that knew itself again, that was coming back.

Strong arms wrapped around his chest.

"Charles?" He pressed his head to Erik's chest. "Nightmare?"

"I didn't project, did I?" Charles could feel the hint of amusement that peeped through the worry in Erik's mind for a moment.

"You're the only person I've ever met who wakes up from a nightmare that looked as fearsome as any of mine, and immediately asks about the safety of your bedmate." Charles was silent. "No, you did not."

"Oh, good." Charles relaxed a bit. "I get those sometimes, bits and piece of other people in my dreams. They can manifest badly, I'm afraid."

"But you're okay?" Charles chuckled and gently separated himself from Erik.

"Don't worry Erik. I just need to clear my head a bit." Charles walked into the bathroom, locked the door, and vomited into the toilet. He stood for a minute, shaking. _It can't come back. I banished it. It can't come back._

Charles looked in the mirror. He was only him. No flames in his eyes. For just a second he stared at a brush, not focusing on anything in particular.

The brush jerked. Charles stepped back and slammed his hands against his ears out of reflex, flinging up every defense he could think to use. The mirror cracked. Charles stifled a shriek, and screamed into his mind _Get out!_

When Charles looked at the mirror again, there was no crack. The brush lay still on the counter. There were no murmurs in his mind. Just the vague feeling of the other mutants in the manor sleeping, and Erik's wakeful concern, and farther from that the constant background noise of the rest of the world.

Charles ran a hand through his hair. God. He had to be going insane.

"Charles, are you all right in there?" He shook his head rapidly, then opened the door. Erik was frowning. "You've been there awhile."

"Have I?" Charles fought back a sense of panic. Time always did pass oddly when he was in his own mind. "Well, it took quite a bit of water."

"Are you sure you're alright?" Charles chuckled and pushed past Erik, into the bedroom.

"And you claim to be coldhearted." Erik let out a growly noise and yanked on Charles's hips. Charles tipped his head back and let his eyes sparkle, let himself ignore what may or may not have happened. "Though certainly not cold blooded."

Erik shook his head. "Not until you tell me what you were dreaming about."

"It wasn't that bad."

"You're still shaking." Erik rubbed Charles's hip with his hand. "Don't you trust me?"

"To the end." Charles sighed and rested his head against Erik's chest. "I sometimes get fragments from other people's dreams. They tend to be…rather disturbing. Please don't ask anything more."

"As you wish." Erik nuzzled Charles's shoulder. "That's a good enough answer for me."

"Excellent." Charles turned and kissed Erik, pushing away any thoughts of darkness.

* * *

><p>Erik's breathing had evened out. Charles was curled against Erik with his head on the other man's chest, eyes wide open. There was nothing there. Nothing in his mind. Nothing. And if there was, Erik was here, and Erik cared, Erik would help him.<p>

* * *

><p>Charles lay on his back in a hospital bed, doing his best not to cry. He couldn't turn over. It hurt just to lie there and breathe, and it would never stop hurting. When the pain faded, so would any other sensation.<p>

_**My poor Charles.**_ He flinched and closed his eyes. _**They've all left you, haven't they?**_

They had. Erik whom he loved. Raven that he'd sworn to protect.

_**I told you, so long ago, that this would leave you broken.**_ Hot feathers brushed his cheek. _**Let me help you. No one else will, you know that. Let me heal your battered body, make you stand tall once more. Let me give you the power you need to fight the traitors. Let me give you silence.**_

Charles closed his eyes. He was tired. So tired of the nurses flicking through with their pity, of the doctors who tried to gloss over their knowledge that he would never walk again. Tired of struggling only for the two people he loved most in the world to abandon him.

_**You know that I would never leave you**_ The Phoenix crooned. _**Have I not always come when you were in need? Can anyone else say the same?**_

Charles was back on that barren little bit of land. Except now the lights pressed around him so hot they burned him, burned like the center of his mind where that damned coin had penetrated. He stepped to the edge, where the abyss revealed thousands more globes, all minds pressing in on him, all minds that didn't care. And yet Erik was not among them.

_Come to me._ With a rush of sensation the Phoenix soared up, it's wings spreading around Charles and shielding him. He felt the warmth in him, the absence of pain, the absence of noise, as the Phoenix landed and wrapped itself round him.

_**We are one.**_ Bones shattered beyond repair knitting back together, nerves gone cold tingling and readying themselves. A caress, and the scars of the coin were healed. _**They will not destroy you again Charles.**_

"_**No."**_ Charles spoke aloud as he sat up. _**"They will not." **_

**A/N: I think that losing one's lover and beloved sister would certainly drive a man to desperate measures. Plus paraplegia and the trauma of having a coin shoved through your head. Also, Charles's ages are six or sevenish when he goes into the mental asylum, sixteenish when he's raped, and whatever age he is in First Class during the rest, since those were set during the movie. **

**Review for the second part?**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Yes, I suck. This should have been done a long time ago. But it was hard, even though I LOVE uberpowerful!Charles. I might end up writing him as Onslaught too, just because I love him so much.**

**Also, thank you for all the wonderful reviews.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own the franchise. For crying out loud, it's older than I am! **

In the early hours of the morning, a hospital burned to the ground. The alert didn't reach the local fire department until the fire had grown to enormous heights, with flames leaping from windows and the death count rising.

In the chaos, no one noticed the mutants frantically trying to make a plan.

"I'll fly." Sean gibbered. "He's in room 376, it had a window, I could get to it and grab him."

"You don't have your wings." Alex pushed against Hank's restraining arm. "Let me go in! I can just blast the flames out of my way!"

"No! The whole place is collapsing, you have to let the firemen just do their jobs!"

"What, and you think they're going to get to the third floor and _carry_ the professor down three flights of stairs that are on fucking fire?" Alex snapped at Hank. "They can't do anything!"

"Neither can we! He might already have gotten out anyway!"

"The Professor can't even walk, he'll end up suffocating!" Sean looked from Hank to Alex. "We have to do something!"

"Like what?" Hank asked. "Die?"

"He'd do it for _us!_" Alex snarled back. Hank growled, his claws curling out. Alex scowled and readied himself to unleash a blast. "If you want to stand back and let the Professor die, be my guest, but don't even act like you can stop me!"

"Oh, yes I can." Hank's voice came out savage. "And the Professor would want me to."

"How do you know? You aren't a telepath!" Alex shoved Hank. Sean gulped. "I'm going to save him, and there's nothing you can do to stop me!"

"Just watch me!" Hank grabbed Alex's arm. At the same moment, there was a terrific rumble. The firemen fell back, waving their arms and calling for the spectators to run, get out of the way.

"You guys…" Sean stared in horror as the building collapsed. Glass shattered, concrete shook. "I think it's a moot point."

"He can't be dead." Alex snapped. Hank, all his bestiality stripped by the mound of rubble, responded hollowly.

"The Professor couldn't walk." He touched Alex's shoulder. "We need to…"

"_Guys!"_ Sean pointed. Hank squinted. The flames still leapt at the sky, but there was a figure emerging from the ruins. Walking through the flames. For a second, Hank thought he wasn't seeing something human. Just a dark silhouette with two pits of flame for eyes, and every step it took towards them made his skin crawl. The instincts his serum had triggered were pulling at his mind, whispering to him that he needed to run.

"_Professor?" _Alex bolted forward. Sean followed barely a step behind him. Hank stared.

No. Charles stepped from the fires, just him, not…whatever Hank thought he saw.

"Mom!" It fell from Alex's lips before he could stop himself. Charles turned to him and raised one eyebrow. Alex and Sean stopped short. "A-are you okay?"

The Professor certainly looked fine. He was unscathed, without even a singed sleeve. His hospital gown had somehow been replaced with a suit.

"Never better." Charles walked right past them. "Hank. Keys."

Hank handed them over automatically. This wasn't _possible._ They had seen the medical reports when Charles was unconscious, when doctors muttered that he had gone into some kind of coma, when his heartbeat jumped erratically, and he'd gone into cardiac arrest a thousand times and the whitefaced nurses would spring up, only for the heart monitor to resume soft beeps before the electric pads could touch his chest. They had thought Charles might die, and that even if he pulled through, there wasn't a snowballs chance in hell he'd be able to walk. "Professor, what…"

"The doctors were wrong. Come. I'm purchasing plane tickets. We'll be back at the manor by this evening." Alex and Sean looked at each other uncertainly. Hank's look mirrored their's. "Are you three going to stand there all day, or follow?"

* * *

><p>"I want you to check on him." Emma raised one delicate eyebrow at her new boss. Erik scowled. "You're a telepath, I assume your powers can stretch that far."<p>

"And if the Professor has some objection to my browsing through his mind?"

"Charles" Magneto corrected himself "Professor X isn't likely to do anything to you other than push you away, if he senses you. And you always have the ability to go diamond."

"As you wish." Emma rolled her shoulders. The former Hellfire club was sheltered in an old apartment in California - and as far as Emma was concerned, there were better places in California they could be inhabiting. If they had access to money. Which they didn't. "Is there anything in particular you want me to look for?"

"Make sure he's okay." Ah, and there was that. The fact that Emma didn't even need to use her abilities (not that she could) to see that Magneto wasn't nearly as detached as he needed to be. _This_ was why she detested lover's quarrels.

"How enormously specific." She stared at a wall. "Now let me concentrate."

Emma blocked out the noise of Mystique feeling somewhat uncomfortable nude around Azazel and Riptide, Azazel's bored wonderings about when he could next stab someone, Riptide's running commentary about their boss's taste in headgear, and Angel's bored contemplations of three-ways.

She focused, and _there_.

_**Burn.**_

Emma screamed, her hands going to her head. She shifted into diamond form almost instantly - and didn't stop screaming, little chips of crystal spilling out of her mouth. Erik stared in shock as she was flung back through the wall, flying through three sets of drywall before crashing into a concrete back wall hard enough to leave a crater.

There was a shriek from the other room as Raven scrambled back automatically. Azazel already had a dagger in his hand. Angel was staring in utter astonishment. Riptide, the least affected, began picking pieces of broken plaster off the floor.

With a gurgle, Emma reverted. She was a mess. The normally pristine white suit was torn, with drizzles of blood making tracks against the white. Red rivulets ran from her nose and mouth. Emma clutched her stomach, breathing harshly.

Magneto stepped closer, but made no other move. He was as startled as any of the others.

"What happened?" Emma's face was nearly as pale as her diamond form.

"I…" Emma shuddered. "I did not expect that."

"Is Charles okay?" Emma managed to glare at Magneto. Trust him to be thinking about the psychic entity who walloped her rather than his own telepath.

"I have no idea. Quite frankly, I haven't the faintest if what I just brushed was your friend at all, and if it was, then your time would be best suited worrying about yourself." She touched her lip, smearing the blood. "I'm going to a dark room, and I need medical attention, soon. I think some of my ribs are broken."

* * *

><p>Charles Xavier lay on his bed, idly watching sparks trickle over his fingertips. There was no need for sleep. No being of his power needed sleep. Instead he toyed with the fire, simply enjoying moving his toes.<p>

_**The fire is beautiful.**_

_I know._ Charles bent his fingers into a claw, and made a ring of flames leap up around the edges of the room. _The mortals are sleeping?_

_**Yes. We could give them nightmares.**_

_Pathetically easy._ Charles shot the flames at the window, shattering it. He caught the shards in the air before they hit the floor. _Emma Frost tried to touch us earlier._

_**We took care of her quite well, in my opinion.**_

_She should be further dissuaded._ Charles reassembled the mirror, molding the pieces together in an imperfect circle. He proceeded to melt it, letting his mind twist it to whatever patterns came to mind. _I have no wish for Shaw's bitch to even think about poking about in my head._

_**You are a wiser man than you once were.**_

_I've learned._

_**Indeed.**_ Charles heard a low laugh, as sudden bands formed around Emma Frost's lungs. In a small room thousands of miles away, Emma was heaving for breath, blue flames flickering around her cot.

"Who are you?" Emma choked out. Charles pressed her wrists to the cot.

"_**A nightmare."**_ Emma had no right to be with Erik. No right to be the telepath who helped him, when Charles was the one who had soothed his nightmares, when Charles was the one who had seen how much good was in Erik, when Charles had been the one who unlocked those magnetic powers and shown Erik how much power he truly had.

_**But you misjudged. You believed that he was wise enough, good enough to stay with you, and he wasn't. Maybe you only saw what you wanted to see. We both know that Erik betrayed you. He won't even let you see his mind. Did he ever even trust you?**_

_I…I know. Emma doesn't know what she's getting herself into._

_**No, she does not. For she took us on as enemies.**_

"_**Foolish girl." **_Charles hissed at the blonde. _**"You have no idea of what's to come. I should kill you now and spare you the pain."**_

_Let's not._

_**Why?**_

_It's unnecessary. I'm tired of torturing her, she's as scared as she's going to get. _With a huff of irritation, the Phoenix pulled away from Emma. She shuddered, trying to keep her mind sane.

Charles snapped his fingers, and sent a lightning strike at the fountain outside. He snickered quietly as it cracked in half. Once, his Stepfather had held his head down in that fountain until he was seconds from death, then yanked him out and laughed at him. It's destruction brought him great satisfaction.

_**It's wonderful, to wreak destruction like this.**_ Charles focused on the satellite dish, the one Erik had moved, the time he had seen the illusion of goodness in the man's mind, and been too foolish to know that it was a lie.

With a screech, it was pounded into fragments.

* * *

><p>"They're scared, you know." Erik folded his arms. Emma was absolutely still on her cot, a spate of new bruises going up her arms. They were very unsettling. Erik pushed his mind away from how they almost looked like claw marks. "Especially Angel and Raven. Pardon me, Mystique."<p>

"Scared of what?"

"They think Professor X has found a telekinetic. One powerful enough to reach across the country to hurt us, and they're right to be afraid." Emma cracked an eye open. "I assume that was all you wanted?"

"The report on the brotherhood's mental state is appreciated, but not the purpose of this visit. I was going to inquire after your health."

"I am in pain." Emma's voice cut like diamonds. "I have been burned, my organs feel bruised, and my favorite suit is ruined."

"Charles must not have very good control over the telekinetic."

"Are you entirely sure he isn't the telekinetic?" Emma pointed out. "Telepathy and telekinesis have always been linked."

"This" Erik waved a hand at her. "Is not the work of Charles Xavier. I know him."

"If you're certain. But I wouldn't be so sure in your knowledge of the Professor." She closed her eyes again. "Surely you have another reason for disturbing me."

"I have a plan. I thought you would appreciate being the first to know."

"Do tell."

"A few thousand miles from here, in Nevada, there's a government facility. It's one of the few places in the US from which you can launch a full arsenal of nuclear weapons."

"Why not just go for the pentagon? It would be just as effective."

"Officially, this place doesn't exist." Erik's lips twitched. "It was designed to be somewhere no one would know about, a fallout shelter for the most important government officials if things were to go drastically wrong. Such as, if a threat like mutants ever surfaced."

"And once you've seized the weapons?"

"Fire on Washington. Fire on London. Fire on Beijing. These weapons have incredible range, we can send a bomb straight to Russia."

"So you're going to do as Shaw tried to do, and start a war." Erik's fists clenched.

"_No_!" The metal legs of Emma's cot twisted. "I'm going to _end_ every war. The world will be thrown into chaos, and mutants will ride out the wave into victory. The humans will be so crippled they'll never have a chance to recover."

"You paint an intriguing picture." Emma let out a long breath. "If it's my approval you're after, you've got it. Though I didn't think filling your 'gap' would include granting you absolution for your every action."

"I only wanted to make sure no one would be difficult." Emma giggled. "Do not try my patience!"

"Don't expect all telepaths to be alike." Emma shot back. "I'm in no position to coddle you, and if you wanted someone to make you feel better about your plots, you might as well have stayed with the Professor." She dissolved into laughter.

"…what's wrong with you?" Erik stalked around her. Emma's head lolled.

"You don't know what you're doing or what you seek tiny birds on tiny branches peek logic is a little bird tweeting in a field logic is a wreath of pretty flowers that smell bad bad like the future." Madness flickered in her eyes.s

"What the hell happened to you?"

"Fire." Emma's eyes danced. "Fire so hot it melts diamonds and cracks ice. Fire to turn bones into ashes."

Erik leaned forward. "He has a pyro?"

"I _don't know_." The whites of Emma's eyes showed. "Stop questioning me. I can tell you nothing, and if we keep talking about him, it will notice. Do not send my mind down that road."

"Fine." Erik backed up. "Try to get a handle on yourself. Send someone to find me when you can speak again."

He left, feeling deeply disturbed.

* * *

><p>"The hell happened out there?" Sean asked incredulously. Hank and Alex crowded behind him, staring out the windows.<p>

The lawn was torn up, as if by enormous talons. One of the fountains was cracked in half, so that water spilled over the ground. The ground itself was so hot that clouds of steam rose up, almost like smoke. A few windows were shattered. Half of the garden had been burned to ash.

"Professor!" Alex yelled.

"I'm right here. There's no need to yell." Hank jumped. How the hell had Charles snuck up on them like that? He had animal hearing, and he hadn't heard a single footstep. "What do you want?"

"The lawn…" Sean gestured. The Professor raised his eyebrows.

"And?"

"It's torn up!"

"I hardly see why you're so concerned." The kids stared at him. Charles's lips twitched up. "No one is bleeding. No one is dead. If a bit of broken turf disturbs you this much, I'd hate to see what happens when a real threat presents itself."

"We're…sorry?" Sean tried. Hank was staring at the Professor. He could never have imagined Charles Xavier saying something like that. Then his ear caught a sound.

"Professor, there's a car coming down the drive." Hank fought back panic. "I should go inside."

"Do so." Charles glared down the driveway, where a black vehicle was approaching. "I'll deal with this."

* * *

><p>Charles stood at the top of the steps and watched as the men got out of the car. It certainly didn't take the government long to find them.<p>

_**Kill them.**_

_Wait. I want to see what they want. But as for Moira…I should have taken care of her before now. As soon as this is over, she's going to burn._ Charles glared down at the suited men.

"Is there something we can help you gentleman with?" They were both carrying guns. More men with guns were waiting inside the car, hidden behind tinted windows. Charles could have laughed at the precaution - as if tinted windows would stop the Phoenix from seeing.

"Professor Xavier?" It may have sounded like a question, but they knew who he was.

"Expecting a cripple?"

"You and your team are hereby commanded by the United States Government to come with us, for questioning and detainment." Charles raised his eyebrows.

"And if I refuse?"

"You and your team will be brought in by force." Charles began to laugh. Sean and Alex exchanged nervous looks. "Surrender any and all weapons you carry, and put your hands in the air."

"Neither I nor any other mutant in this manor is going to your prisons." Charles's mouth curved up in a cruel smile. "Are you really sure you want to try forcing us?"

"That's impressive talk for someone so small." The leader had a gun in his hand by the end of the sentence. "Take them, and search the mansion for the others."

"Fools." Charles raised one hand, and the man screamed in pain. Flames shot from his mouth, from where Charles had kindled fire in his stomach. He was raised into the air, blood leaking from his nose, and flung to the side. It happened in the space of seconds.

"_The fuck?"_ Alex scrambled back, yanking Sean with him. Charles rolled his eyes and upended the car with a wave of flame. The men who had gotten out already ducked and covered. Those who had not were lost in fire.

"_**Try to remain calm, boys." **_Charles glared at the remaining operatives. _**"This won't take long." **_

He flexed his fingers.

_This should prove interesting._

_**See how fragile they are? Nothing but bones and meat.**_ Charles understood. He ripped each and every one apart, until the walkway was spattered with blood. The other leader raised his gun, and Charles had to concede that he was at least a courageous man. _**A moronic ape. Do not mistake sheer stupidity for courage.**_

"_**I don't think so." **_Charles caught the bullet in a ball of flame and melted it. Alex and Sean, who cowered on the steps behind him, watched in horror. He focused on the sole survivor, the one who had attempted to shoot him. _**"You led them into this, you know. It's your fault."**_

He raised the man into the air, disintegrating the gun. Then he entered his mind. The man began to writhe as the burning hot presence soared along the lines of his brain. Charles finally let him drop, making a sound of disgust.

"_**I suppose we should feel it's a compliment for someone so high ranking on the chain to come for us." **_He glanced behind him, at Sean and Alex. They were both looking at him as if they'd never seen him before. _**"Are you two quite alright?"**_

"We're fine." Alex managed. Sean nodded mutely. Hank hurried out the doors. He'd been watching from one of the upstairs windows.

"Professor…" Hank swallowed and looked at the scraps of human around them. The one surviving operative was curled up on the ground in a fetal position, whimpering. Charles had snapped his mind. "What is this?"

"I've merely taken an option which in the past, I was blind to the value of." Charles smiled coldly. "And I have interesting news."

"Oh. Um. Really?" Sean was still staying slightly behind Alex. Charles didn't notice.

"Apparently, there's only one place the government believes is truly safe in the case of a mutant attack. A stronghold in Nevada, armed to the teeth with all manner of nuclear weaponry." Charles frowned. "It sounds like something Magneto would have an interest in."

"Uh, what's the plan for these?" Alex made a very small gesture at the still-burning car, the remnants of human, and the one living operative.

"Yes, I suppose these can't be left to just waste away on the lawn." Charles concentrated. The burning car disintegrated, along with the remains of the humans. Sean's hands flew to his mouth in shock. "As for you…"

The operative got to his feet, eyes dead.

_**You will return to your base. You will say that their information is wrong, that this is not a mutant stronghold. You will erase Charles Xavier, Erik Lensherr, Raven Xavier, Sean Cassidy, Alex Summers, and Hank McCoy from the government's database. You will shoot Moira McTaggert. Following this, you will shoot yourself. **_The man blinked and nodded.

"What did you do?" Hank asked. The operative had turned around and was walking down the path with a purposeful stride. He knew exactly what his mission was. He knew exactly what he had to do before he would have peace.

"I took care of a few problems." Charles frowned. "But we need to find out if Magneto is going to move on this information. I know he has it." He'd seen it in Erik's mind long ago, that a base in Nevada existed. At the time, he passed over the information as one more scrap of knowledge that Erik had accumulated in his search for Shaw.

"How are you going to do that?" Sean regretted the question as soon as he asked, when Charles turned to him. In the depths of those blue eyes, he could still see flames flickering.

"I'll figure something out." Sean shivered. Those were the same words Charles said whenever there was a problem, but the tone was utterly _wrong._

* * *

><p><em><strong>What, exactly, are you doing?<strong>_

_Checking a history book._

_**And why, pray tell, are you doing that?**_

_I want to make sure I'm right about a date. Aha - and so I am._

_**Two days from now is the anniversary of a city burning, what of it?**_

_I think that's when Erik is going to attack the base._

_**What, simply to honor an ancient volcano? That war was nothing compared to the havoc we could wreak in mere days. Or to what Erik would do with the power of a nuclear station in his hands. Why bother to stop him? **_

_Because…because he'll start a hundred wars._

_**The mortals are always at war. **_

_Yes, I know that full well. I've seen their minds, and it's what they always think of._

_**Always thinking of hate or fear or selfish desires, and yet they are always weak. They will never understand us. They fear us.**_

_They're right to fear us. And we're not going to stop a war. We're going to stop Erik from making a world that exists on his terms._

_**You're right, he can't be trusted to shape the world. And he does not deserve the chances you gave him. **_

_Yes. I'm going to talk to Hank about requisitioning another plane from the government, to get us there. After that last attempt to take us, the least the government can do for us is to provide transportation._

Charles looked up from his book as Hank hesitantly stepped into the library. "Hank, just the mutant I was looking for."

"Um, yes. I wanted to ask you a few things." Charles stared at him. Hank looked nervous. "About what you did to the CIA agents."

"They're no longer a threat, I hardly see what more you need to ask about. Does the government have any other high-speed planes?" Hank twitched.

"Yeah, but they're all guarded. We might have been able to get access if we worked with the government, but now that you've gone and slaughtered a whole team of agents…" Hank twitched again. "Professor, um, how did you do that? You hadn't mentioned a mutation for telekinesis, or pyrokinesis…"

"My mind has grown." Charles's voice was very, very, deadly. "Are you doubting me? Do you think that anyone else would keep you here? I could easily throw you back into society, and then your feet would be the least of your problems."

"I-I'm sorry." Hank's voice shook. Charles could read the fear in his eyes. "The planes are all in a hangar at the same base we stayed at before, but none of them are as fast as the other was, and they all have tracers on them. It would take me six hours to fly one to Nevada."

"Erik will attack the base in the day after tomorrow." Charles checked his watch. "Tomorrow we find a plane, and then fly to the base by the next morning." He tossed the book aside.

"Are all of us going?" Hank asked.

"Obviously. You need all the combat practice you can get, if that display on the beach was anything to go by." Charles said disgustedly. The Phoenix had cleared his mind, and showed him just what a display of incompetence Cuba had been. Hank nodded rapidly and backed out of the study.

* * *

><p>"I still don't know." Hank whispered. Sean held his pillow to his chest. Alex stared at the bedcover. Hank shivered. "And it felt like he would kill me if I pushed it."<p>

"I don't understand." Sean said miserably. "Ever since Erik left, it's he doesn't even care about us. He just ignores our existence."

"I know. If I wanted to live like this, I could have stayed in jail." Alex said softly. "Not that living with Dad would be any better."

"Yeah. What are we going to do if the professor stays like this? I can't even imagine going home, and neither of you has _anywhere_ to go." Sean clutched the pillow tighter. "I want him to start caring again."

"Me too." Alex didn't seem able to look up. "I never thought I'd see him _kill_ someone. Do you think he caused that fire?"

"I wish I could say no." Hank shivered. "Do you remember when he walked out and wasn't even burned? It was like he was part of it."

"I wonder how many people were in that hospital. I don't think anyone got out." Alex said. Sean sniffled. "And now we've got to go and fight the Brotherhood. How are we supposed to fight Erik and Raven?"

"I'll bet you anything that the professor will take care of _him._" Hank muttered.

* * *

><p><em><strong>Charles, you are troubled.<strong>_ Charles lay on his back, watching the stars through his window. The flames playing around his hands were forgotten. _**There will be a battle soon, you should not be so sad.**_

Charles didn't respond.

_**It's his fault.**_ The Phoenix's voice was disgusted. _**The last time before you went to fight, you had him in your embrace. **_It changed to pitying. _**Ah, you miss having a bedmate. **_

_The last time I couldn't sleep before a battle…Erik was there._

_**Poor, poor Charles. No one can deny that Erik knew how to please. It was one of the ways that he made you ignore his true nature, was it not?**_ Charles flushed. _**You let him have such power over you, and never thought he would abuse it? Such unmerited trust was not rational. **_

_We both know that I was a fool._

_**But you cannot help missing the comfort of his body. Let me help you. **_Charles's eyes flew open. He'd felt a lover's caress on his hip. _**All the sensation comes from the mind, Charles.**_

_That's…_ The Phoenix worked it's way down, making Charles suck in his breath.

_**Forget Erik. I am everything you need.**_

* * *

><p>The invasion of the hangar was easy. The guards on duty didn't know they were coming- all they felt was a sudden pressure inside their chests, then nothing. Charles smiled and walked past, kicking one's arm aside as he went.<p>

"Hank, which is fastest?"

"T-the TI-84." Hank pointed to the closest plane, doing his best to not look at the dead body lying by his feet. Sean had gone green the second he saw the blood leaking from the man's mouth. "I can pilot it, but you need a key to get in and to start the engines."

"That won't be a problem." Charles stepped up to the plane. His brow furrowed.

_The mechanism is…never mind. I have it._ A hatch on the bottom opened, a ladder extending down. Charles climbed up it, motioning for the others to follow. Hank strapped himself into the pilot seat.

"Right. Everyone buckle in, this model isn't as smooth as the other, and we might encounter turbulence." It was a very good thing that the military made sure these models always had a full tank. People were _bound_ to notice that the best plane in the military was missing. "Professor…"

"On it." Charles sat in one of the seats. He saw no need for a seat belt. The engine rumbled to life. Alex and Sean flinched simultaneously. "Take us up."

"Right." Hank flicked the switches to key the engines to the right modes, and began steering them out. Please God no one from the military came to check on the sudden lack of communication between this base and the rest of the world.

Please God none of those dead soldiers had families.

* * *

><p>With a soft <em>bamf<em>, the Brotherhood of mutants appeared in the deserts of Nevada. Erik instantly sank into a crouch, scoping out the building. If one didn't know what it was, they might have mistaken it for a simple bunker.

The outside was made of steel plating, with only one story visible above ground. Two guards stood outside the main doorway. Security cameras no doubt broadcasted a constant feed to the weapons room.

A host of other guards were also stationed around, in less obvious foxholes. Erik was willing to bet that for each clump of brush, there was a gun.

Well. Time to let those guards know just how ineffective their weaponry was against the future. Erik got to his feet, gesturing for the rest of the Brotherhood to follow him, and let out a battle cry. As expected, gunfire rattled toward them.

Fools. Erik flung up a hand and sent the bullets back at the shelter.

"Angel, in the air! I want you picking them off from above." Angel nodded and rose up. "Azazel, Mystique, with me. Riptide, winds." A smile curled around Erik's mouth. "Let's show them just how hopeless their resistance is."

Riptide spread his arms, and the winds began to whip around them. They caught Erik's cape and sent it flying around him, a beacon of red against the skies. A human would have noticed that it made him an obvious target. Erik smiled instead.

He wanted them to have something to fire at. The more bullets they wasted, the better.

* * *

><p>"Professor!" Hank yelled. Charles whipped his head towards the beast. "Tornado!"<p>

"Steer us towards it." Charles braced himself against his power as the plane lurched. "That's Magneto."

Hank pulled on the controls as the winds caught them, yanking the plane to the side.

* * *

><p>"Eri - Magneto!" Raven grabbed his arm and pointed upward. "There's a plane up there!"<p>

Erik looked up. His eyes widened. Caught in Riptide's wind was a government plane-and he just _knew_ Charles was in it. There was no one else in the world who would have guessed that they were attacking this base, and been foolhardy enough to try and defend it.

"It's going to crash!" Raven screamed. Erik flung out a hand.

* * *

><p>Alex yelled and grabbed his seat as the plane tipped on it's side. Sean went green. Charles raised an eyebrow, utterly undisturbed. He had kept in position, using his power to balance against gravity.<p>

Hank roared and thrust a lever, trying to bring them to the ground. Suddenly, the plane evened out, though the winds battered it.

"_**Erik."**_ Charles snarled. His eyes turned to flame, and the plane went into a tailspin.

* * *

><p>"What in the hell?" Erik had felt an entirely separate force drag the plane away from him. He stared in horror as it spun towards the ground, entirely outside his control. At the last second it evened out, into a smooth landing.<p>

A new round of gunfire came towards them. Erik flicked it away, staring at the plane. A door opened.

He'd been right. Out raced the X-men. Sean immediately took to the skies with his eyes on Angel. Hank followed, bounding out with a roar. Alex ran behind him, fists braced in the familiar ready gesture.

After them, Charles walked out. Erik stared. He couldn't put his finger on it, but Charles's walk had changed. It was more deliberate, and his features more remote. Raven's eyes followed him, a frown marring her features.

So it wasn't only in Erik's head.

"Charles!" Erik walked towards the base. The soldiers who rose out of the ground - foxholes, he knew it - fired at him. He wrapped their rifles around their throats. "Come to see the new reign of mutant kind?"

"_**Come to stop you." **_A wave of invisible force lashed into Erik's chest. It sent him flying into the side of the base. What the _hell?_

"Charles!" Raven rushed forward. Azazel grabbed her arm, his eyes flickering with alarm. Charles didn't look much like Charles. His eyes had disappeared into twin fires, and little flames traced their way around his torso.

More soldiers were bolting out of their foxholes, aiming and firing at anyone non-human. Erik hurled their guns from them. Charles glared at them, and they became bonfires.

"Charles, what is this?" Erik prayed that none of the Brotherhood was going to get involved in this. Raven had escaped Azazel's hold and was running toward them both - there was no longer any danger from the soldiers, and the base couldn't fire on them when they were so close.

Judging by the way Hank and Alex were hanging back, and the fear on their faces, the biggest threat here was Charles. Or whatever this _thing_ his former lover was turning into.

"_**You wanted an enemy out of me."**_ Charles glared. _**"And so you have one."**_ He threw up a hand as Riptide aimed the tornado at him. _**"Pathetic.**_

Riptide was blasted backwards. Azazel appeared next to him, grabbing his hand just before the land on which he'd been lying erupted into flame. The two materialized behind Erik and Raven.

"I didn't want you as an enemy!" Erik thought Charles knew that. "I want…the enemy is in there! The humans!"

"_**You made of me an enemy when you left."**_ Charles looked up. Angel was coming toward them, with Sean in pursuit.

"Charles, no!" Charles raised a hand and yanked her from the sky. Raven's hands went to her mouth as Angel crashed to the ground with a scream. Sean's eyes traced her fall, full of horror.

How had Charles _done _that? Erik pushed the Brotherhood toward the building. Charles was panting, his face flushed and flames which grew ever-bigger licking around his feet. He looked like he couldn't see the world around him.

Erik had never, ever, seen Charles kill.

Or use telekinesis, let alone telekinesis strong enough to control a plane and pull a girl from the sky. A girl Charles had at one time been responsible for, tried to protect.

Were the kids _safe_ with him?

"Azazel-" Erik couldn't think of what he was supposed to order. Getting into the base wouldn't matter, they couldn't fire any of weapons at Charles, not when he was that close. Something beeped. "What was that?"

"Ze communications." Azazel flicked his tail. "Zey are sending out a message."

"Raven, use the radio." Raven, whose hands shook, took the small device off her belt. They had been monitoring army communications for weeks. Erik saw Hank, on the other side of the field, doing the same to a different model.

"_Scritchscritchscirtchgoodbye to our families and our friends. We are proud to make this sacrifice for our country."_ Riptide and Azazel looked at each other blankly. _"Initiate protocol 0."_

"Oh my god!" Hank's voice turned to a roar. Hank had worked with the CIA, he knew most of their codes. Erik really, really, didn't like the way that sounded. "They're blowing up the base!"

"What?" Erik whipped around to stare at the stronghold. Hank looked across at them, utterly shocked. Raven screamed. It seemed that someone in the base had realized that they had no hope of defending themselves, and was going to try and take out the mutants with them.

How many tons of uranium and plutonium were in this base? How many explosives? Enough to level the…the desert, which was completely uninhabited for miles and miles, save for 9 mutants and whoever was in that base.

Erik closed his eyes and wished that he could have kissed Charles goodbye.

There was a colossal _noise_, then silence. Erik opened his eyes.

Every single missile in the base had exploded. Everything inside the nucleus of the blast was gone, in defiance of the laws of mass. But the blast itself, a force that should have reduced all of them to less than cinders, was still expanding. Erik could see tiny flames kindling in slow motion, as an explosion that ought to have lasted a split second was suppressed.

"Gott…" Erik felt the air around him stirring. The dust around them was rising, then dirt. And it was speeding up. He turned his eyes to Charles.

Charles was rising with the dust. His arms stretched out, but his hands hung limp, his head thrown back and eyes unfocused. Fire roared around him. Charles had become the center of a creature of flame, with enormous wings stretching up to the heavens and a body that sucked oxygen from the air. It looked like a huge bird, something made of flame.

A _Phoenix_.

The land began to shake. The exploding base was falling in on itself.

"Azazel!" Erik yelled. The mutant was staring at Charles, frozen, with a look of pure awe on his face. Erik yanked on his arm. As the winds _were they even winds, or just force bending out from Charles? _picked up, it was near impossible to hear. "Get the kids out, all of them! Get them as far away as you can!"

Azazel nodded. The earth began to crack, trickles of magma rising to the surface. Raven stumbled forward.

"We can't leave you here!" Erik pushed her towards Azazel. Raven wheeled around, her eyes wide. "I can't leave him!"

"I'll try to break through to him, but you have to _go!_" The very air around them was being sucked away. Raven's eyes shone with tears, tears that were instantly dragged from her eyes and evaporated. Erik turned around to face Charles. "Charles! Charles, stop!"

Azazel grabbed both of Raven's wrists, and Janos wrapped an arm around the red skinned man's waist. Raven began to speak. They vanished before the words could reach Erik. Through the vortex of matter gathering around Charles, Erik caught sight of Azazel grabbing Angel's body, then appearing before the X-men.

God, those poor kids. The jet they'd come in on was disintegrated, turned into particles that whirled around Charles. Erik stared across at them, gesturing for them to go with Azazel. Raven turned around to him again, motioning to her head with her hands.

Then they were gone. Erik prayed that it was to somewhere far from here, continents away. Then as more lava streamed up from the earth, Erik doubted that even that would be safe.

"Charles! Charles, please!"

"_**I am outside your influence, Magneto."**_ Charles's mouth moved, though his eyes were still sightless. The wings kept expanding, as if they'd take up the entire sky, cover all the earth in fire.

"Charles! Please, it's me, it's Erik!" He reached out with a hand. "Charles, whatever's influencing you, you have to be in there, and you have to know me!"

"_**I thought I did."**_ This time Charles's head turned to him, if only fractionally. The land around them shook even more violently. Erik realized with a surge of horror that _Charles didn't trust him_.

Was this even Charles?

Erik could feel the forces pulling around him, but nothing had spontaneously combusted him yet, Charles could not want to harm him. He couldn't imagine a Charles who truly wanted destruction. Or perhaps his helmet was protecting him…

The helmet. Raven had been gesturing for him to take it off. Charles could read minds, Charles could hear thoughts louder than words, could see a lie from truth.

He fumbled with the straps that kept the helmet on his head, his fingers going numb. Whether it was Charles finally getting under his skin or pure fear, Erik had no idea. He was being a fool to give up his only protection.

Then again, no one on earth could be counted as safe now. With a last desperate tug, Erik took the helmet off. It was whipped away. Erik stared up at Charles, who now hung in the center of bright white light.

_Charles! Charles please!_ Erik took a step forward, feeling the force try to pull him further. _Charles, for nothing but my love, listen to me!_

Charles's head tipped in his direction, a faint line creasing his brow.

It was not hard to make his thoughts into screams.

_Charles, I love you and if you do this you are going to destroy this entire world and yourself! You are already destroying yourself! Charles, please…_Erik, for once in his life, didn't care that he was begging. _I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I could never lie to you in my own thoughts, you know that, come back to me!_

"Erik?" The flames abruptly cleared from Charles's eyes, and there was nothing but gentle blue again. Erik held out a hand.

_Charles, you will lose yourself here. Stop this._

It was as if Erik had woken him from a deep sleep. Charles's head turned again, staring around him in shock. He shook his head, making the earth around them buckle.

_Erik, the children?_ The voice which came into his thoughts was faint and full of pain, but it was unmistakably Charles.

_Away from here. _Relief crossed Charles's face. Erik took another step forward.

"_**I AM THE PHOENIX"**_ Erik cried out in pain as the voice thundered around them. In the center of the beast Charles convulsed. _**"WHAT ARE YOU DOING? STOP!"**_

Erik squinted at Charles. An expression oddly like peace had settled on his face. Charles made eye contact with him, something between an apology and a goodbye in their depths.

"_Charles!" _

* * *

><p>"<em><strong>WHAT ARE YOU DOING? STOP!"<strong>_ A voice louder than thunder, louder than anything in existence, roaring through every part of his brain. Had he strength in his body, Charles would have gone back into convulsions.

_He loves me._

"_**HE'S A LIAR, YOU NEED ME, STOP THIS ."**_

_This is wrong._

"_**ARE YOU INSANE? I AM YOU, WE ARE ONE BEING, I AM LOCKED ROUND YOUR SOUL. NO MORTAL CAN DESTROY ME!"**_

_I can make you leave though. You lied. You need me, you need me to be in this world. _

"_**I AM BOUND TO YOU."**_ Charles let his eyes flutter shut.

_I know._

* * *

><p>Erik put a hand over his eyes as the entire world went white, in a flash of light too bright for the eyes of mutant and human alike. A breeze ruffled his hair and sent his cape flying behind him.<p>

He opened his eyes. There was no Phoenix. There was only Charles, plummeting from the sky. Erik rushed forward, and caught Charles in his arms. He was light as a child, and ice cold.

"Charles? Charles!" Erik shook the body. He didn't even look up to see the swathe of absolute nothing that surrounded them, land wiped bare and completely flat all the way to the Rockies. Thousands of miles away humans were stumbling from their homes yelling about earthquakes, about how everything but them had just broken.

Had he known, he wouldn't have cared. Charles was limp. Erik kept shaking him, desperation growing. Charles's head tipped back, revealing a white face and half open eyes which saw nothing.

There a soft sound, and two people appeared. Erik heard the thump of footsteps then Raven flung herself next to him. She must have convinced Azazel to bring her back.

"Erik what - _no!_" Raven grabbed Charles's side and shook. He lurched like a sack of dead meat. "Charles!"

"He can't be gone." Erik's voice was impossibly blank. "He can't have gone. He beat it."

Azazel slowly approached. Raven had begun to cry, wracking sobs that shook Charles's body every time she took a breath. The devil crouched down and pressed a finger onto Charles's throat.

He looked up at Erik, and shook his head.

"That's not possible." Erik grasped Charles tighter. "He has to wake up. Charles wouldn't leave us. Whatever the hell that was couldn't make him leave, he can't, he won't, he isn't…goddammit Charles, _wake up!_"

Raven's sobs grew louder. Erik waited. Azazel drew back in silence.

When the sun went down, Erik stopped his pleading. He unclasped his cape and wrapped it around Charles, whose eyes were still blank and who still did not breathe. Raven's sobs had died down to shakes and whimpers.

Erik rose to his feet, still cradling Charles. Raven did not let go of her brother's hand. Without question, Azazel took her other hand and teleported.

* * *

><p>"Erik! Professor!" They appeared in what looked like a science lab. Sean and Alex were seated on a couple of benches, shivering. Riptide and Angel, on the other side of the room, got up. Hank, who had called out, froze.<p>

"Where are we?" Erik asked softly.

"Antarctic science base. Most remote place available, short notice." Azazel said. Even he looked shell-shocked.

"P-professor?" Sean stepped forward, his eyes fixed on the motionless bundle. Raven closed her eyes, fresh tears dribbling down her cheeks. "P-professor?"

"He got rid of it." Erik knew the strength was going to go out of his legs soon.

"Brave man." Azazel commented. He retreated to Riptide's side. "Very brave man."

"But he's not…" Alex, for all his muscle, looked like he could keel over. "He can't be…"

"I'm sorry." Erik clutched Charles tighter. "I tried."

"No!" The word ripped itself from Alex's throat. "That's not possible!"

"Made a choice." Azazel sank into a seat. Teleporting across two continents must have taken it out of him. Riptide rested a hand on his shoulder. "Good choice."

"But he wouldn't leave us!" Alex insisted. Erik just shook his head. "He promised!"

"No one keeps every promise." Erik closed his eyes. "We need to go somewhere safe, to mourn."

"Charles w-was going t-to be buried at the manor." Raven looked like the words were causing her more pain than anything in the world ever had. "Not on the family plot in England. B-but we can't just…we n-need to…"

"Azazel." The teleporter wearily looked up. "One more trip."

* * *

><p>Erik couldn't remember going to the manor. He had a vague notion that Azazel had gotten them there then collapsed, and Raven had pointed him and Riptide to a room, and that there was something about tending to wounds. All he could feel was the cold in his arms, as if Charles had sucked every spark of life from himself to throw the Phoenix away.<p>

He woke up on the couch in the library. Raven was curled on a chair with her knees to her chest, and her sleep was evidently not peaceful. Erik pushed himself to his feet, and thought that everything had to have been a dream.

Except that Charles would _never_ let Raven fall asleep on a chair without getting her into bed, and would never let her sit there being consumed by terrible dreams. Erik himself couldn't summon the heart to wake her up. Whatever went on in her head, it had to be better than the nightmare they were living in.

Charles had been put in his bedroom. Erik walked into the room. It was deserted, no one had been able to bear being in the room with their dead teacher. Charles looked very small on that bed. He was laid out on top of the covers, but someone had at least made sure he looked comfortable, with his eyes closed and his head on a pillow.

"You know, I remember the first time I met you." Erik sat down on the edge of the bed. Charles might have been sleeping, but that then Erik would have been holding him, and speaking wouldn't have been necessary. "You telling me to let go, that it wasn't worth dying for. I remember feeling you in my head."

Erik reached over to push a lock of hair away from Charles's eyes. "Then there was the first chess game, when we were still working with the CIA. You won. I'd blame telepathy, but you were just that smart, weren't you? And the first time we…" Erik's voice hitched. "I didn't have a single nightmare that night."

"I remember we met, when he offered me everything from this house I wanted." Raven said from the doorway. She was wearing an threadbare robe - one Erik was certain he'd seen Charles wear - and her eyes had turned old. "I spent the whole night clinging to him, while he read fairy stories to me and reassured me that I didn't have to go. Is this our fault? For leaving?"

"I don't know." Erik closed his eyes and tried not to cry. "It seems like too great a price to pay. And it's not even us paying."

"I don't know what to do now." Raven's voice was oh-so uncertain.

Erik drew his fingers over Charles's cheek. "It seems as though the only thing left is the mourning."

Raven sank into a sitting position and wrapped her arms around her knees. Erik realized that his battle with tears had been lost a long time ago. He sat for hours, until Raven's tears had changed back to uneasy sleep.

The first time he'd seen Charles laughing, how he'd been suddenly breathless for the first time he could remember, and he hadn't minded a bit.

The way Charles's eyes sparkled in the light, the way they darkened just a bit when he was feeling lusty, the way they shone in the morning sunlight when Erik was teasing him into waking up early.

The sensation of Charles's mind brushing against his, the way it brought nothing but comfort.

The time when they'd made love - Erik couldn't keep calling it fucking, not when they were so gentle and Erik was thinking of more than simply lust - and Charles had been lying in his arms, and Erik had been caught in the sudden rush of _something_ and Charles turned over and smiled at him, and told Erik that he loved him, and there was a "too" implied but all Erik could do was bury his nose in Charles's hair and try to believe it was all real.

Charles had deserved more than that. Erik lifted one cold hand and pressed his lips against it.

"I love you. I hope you knew that in the end." Erik felt a tear fall off his nose and splash over Charles's knuckle. "I should go wake the kids up, let them know they can stay here…"

_Please don't go._ Erik froze. The words had been faint but he heard them, he swore he'd heard them.

Was it his imagination, or did Charles's cheeks have just a bit more color than they did the day before? Erik leaned over the body, stroking his fingertips over cheeks that were no longer pure white but just deadly pale.

"Charles, are you in there?" Nothing. But he'd heard it. Erik shuffled around on the bed until he was in a comfortable position, wrapped around Charles. "I won't. I promise I won't leave again."

There was the faintest feel of air over one of his wrists, the one just below Charles's mouth. Erik pressed a kiss to Charles's temple.

_If you're trying to come back, or if you're in there somewhere already…_ Erik held on tighter. _I'm here. I love you. _

_Love you too._ That one had been louder. That one couldn't have been his imagination. Erik caught his breath as Charles, Charles who had been cold as ice hours ago, stirred, his face turning to be closer to Erik. _You…are you okay?_

_I'm fine. Save your strength._ Erik bent his neck and tipped Charles's head up. _Love you._

The lips he kissed were warm. When he drew back Charles had opened his eyes, and two azure orbs, utterly without fire, were glimmering back at him.

"Erik?" Charles couldn't speak above a whisper. "Raven. The kids."

"They're all fine. Raven is asleep." Charles tried to move to look. Erik wrapped his arms around him in a more secure position, shifting so that Charles could see the door and his little sister. "Don't try to move, you need to save your strength."

"Mmhm." Charles sagged back against Erik. The noise seemed to move Raven, who blinked awake. Her eyes settled on Charles and Erik, and widened.

"Charles!" Erik grunted as Raven nearly dove onto the bed. The girl had the sense to grab Charles's hands rather than tackle him at. And she was crying again. "Is…are you…I mean…"

"Shh. I'm okay." Charles whispered. Raven wrapped her arms him. "Just a little tired."

"I'm sorry." Raven kept her hold on his hands. "I'm so, so, so, sorry…"

"It's okay." Charles murmured. "Would one of you wake up the kids? Sean and Alex especially are having nightmares. I could, but…" Charles closed his eyes for a moment. "I'm afraid I don't quite have the energy."

"Yeah, sure." Raven reluctantly got to her feet. Erik nodded to her.

"I'll look after him until you get back." She smiled gratefully and flitted out the door. Charles huffed.

"Erik, I'm not about to go harm myself while lying in a bed."

"Shush." There was a yell from somewhere outside their room. "I think that's…"

"_Professor!_" Sean bolted into the room and flung himself onto Charles. Erik grimaced, but Charles only smiled, raising a hand to feebly pat Sean's arm. Alex and Hank followed, both pausing to stare at Charles.

"I'm fine, you two." Charles managed to smile. "I feel as though I owe you an apology, for what's happened."

"Oh, no!" Hank protested. Alex nodded vigorously and inched closer.

_Erik, budge over a bit to make room for Alex and Hank._ Erik, despite his opinion that Charles should've been resting, did as requested. Almost immediately they had Alex sitting on the bed next to Sean and Hank crouched with them, and Raven clinging to Charles.

* * *

><p>It was hours later when Erik ordered the kids out of the room, telling them that Charles needed to rest and would be perfectly safe here with him. It wasn't until then that Erik got to lie down and relax just a bit, with Charles secure in his arms.<p>

It wasn't until then that Charles let himself cry, and then later, sleep.

There were no dreams that night.

**A/N: I don't do sad endings. This fandom has enough angst, dammit. Review, please?**

**Also, the volcano thingy would be the eruption of Pompeii, which according to some, was Nov. 23****rd****, about a month after the Cuban Missile Crisis and the divorce. Never say fan fiction teaches nothing.**


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